


in that moment, i did call it love

by SamiraScamander



Category: Absentia (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Emily Byrne has a Crush on Cal Isaac, F/M, i will be establishing this as a tag, now i dont even know, started as a s2 rewrite of sorts, you can't see colour until you meet your soulmate au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-06
Updated: 2021-03-06
Packaged: 2021-03-19 05:07:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,185
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29869596
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SamiraScamander/pseuds/SamiraScamander
Relationships: Emily Byrne/Cal Isaac
Comments: 1
Kudos: 6





	in that moment, i did call it love

Cal’s never known colour. For some people, they find it and it stays forever. Some people lose their ability to see colour a few months or years after they found it and are reduced to a life in darkness once again.

These people describe it as the worst feeling imaginable, because you lose the person closest to you too. Some of these people, who found their math already regularly give talks about how beautiful the world actually is and almost lose themselves in the exaggerated way they’re trying to explain it to people who have never seen an ounce of colour in their lives. Whenever one of his friends wants to attend one of them with him, he’s quick to back out of it (he attended one two years ago and it was _dreadfully_ boring.) He’s never known colour and he’s doing absolutely fine.

Cal actually preferred it this way. He was Cal Isaac, a soldier. Seeing colour just wouldn’t do for him.

(Cal wasn’t sure he could actually be a soldier if he could actually see the colour of the land he’s destroying, the colour of the blood of the people he’s killed, enemies and unlucky civilians alike.)  
  
So yeah, Cal Isaac couldn’t see colour and he was perfectly fine with it.

\--

Emily Byrne was four years old when she was told about soulmates the first time. It was during bath time at the orphanage and the carer tells them about how they all have this one person that they will meet at one point and who will bring colour into their lives. What is colour? , she asked, Emily remembers. She also remembers the soft hands of their carer going through her hair, combing it into a nice, beautiful braid.

Before she was adopted, everyone would only get so little time with their carer because there were so many children. She used to beg and cling and put her little claws in her carer’s dress just to climb inside her lap and never having to leave. She had to be removed from her every time, but it never stopped her from trying it again. For such a little creature, she had an astonishing amount of hope.   
  
Thought, it wasn’t that she was hopeful. She knew what would happen, it happened often enough to know it by now. However, Emily was tired of having what she wants taken away from her. She was only four years old, but she would fight tooth and nails to get an extra second, another minute with the only person she ever came close to feeling a bit of affection for.   
  
(it didn’t matter to them. It didn’t matter to anyone there how she felt about it.)

A year later, her carer left and a new one came. This new one is cold and mean and not loving at all. She did everything she had to, but it was all done with an icy undertone, an unkind feeling that followed her and stuck to her like a shadow and soon her unfriendliness seemed to seep into every little corner of her world.

The second time she was told about it was by her parents. She lived with them for a year and a half now and though it was still hard for her, it was the best time of her life so far. Now when she wanted to have time with either of them, they would take time for her or promise her later and do it later with her then if they were busy at the moment. Soulmates and colour made no sense to her. She understood it, but it just felt unjust and illogical to her, though she believed it in. Emily saw it every day, the true love they were all talking about, in her mom and her dad.

\--

“Your partner is Cal Isaac.”, she faintly heard Crown say and turned around to see him. He was an attractive man around her age. He looked kind even though she learned long ago that she shouldn’t judge someone based on their appearance. It was one of the first lessons she ever learned in life, even back in the orphanage.

\--

They’ve been working together for a week now and it’s actually been quite nice. He’s a good partner (been long since she had one -a good one and a partner) and he listens to her completely before he responds to her theories and thoughts and he thinks about what he says before he says it and he’s not afraid to share his thoughts. It’s… it’s _nice._

He got a call and they drove to the crime scene to inspect the murder someone called in. They work in sync and she never appreciated team work before – she still thinks she could solve this case much easier without him even though he proved to be a valuable asset – but it’s good. It _works_.

  
When they stripped down their protective suits and turned to leave, he looks outside the window to find a crowd of journalists and curious neighbours standing in front of the building.   
  
Cal turned back to her.  
  
“You want me to bring the car around the back?”

“No. We’re good.”

“Okay.”

He opened the door for her and cleared the path and kept other people away from her and she didn’t recognize it for what it was back then, but she knew now – it’s affection. It’s support and it’s friendship and partnership and it’s _everything_.

\--

It started small for her, with a coloured mug of coffee or a flicker of colour on someone’s shirt or a coloured flower. It’s an unknown feeling, one she can’t name and it scared her. It does, it terrified her and she shied away from it and tried to ignore it, tried to lose herself in her life and the fast flow of every day, but that only seemed to make it worse. 

Even more things begun to catch colour and it felt like an invasion of her world, and trying to hold on to her black and white view of the world felt exactly like holding on to her carer’s dress even though she knew what was coming. She wouldn’t get what she wanted. Change was coming and it was inevitable.

\--

Cal and her find themselves in Moldova for the time being. She got quiet on the flight and train ride over here after a few hours, when she caught sight of the trees which began to slowly get brighter and filled themselves with a colour which’s name she yet had to learn. It became evermore prominent and stuck out from everything monotone, so she closed her eyes and wished for it to stop.

  
(Of course, that doesn’t come true.)

~~\--~~

It’s a sensation for her, really. She never had this feeling with Nick, never had colour sprinkle out from everywhere when she was with him, even at the best of times. They never talked about it, but she knew that he didn’t either. They weren’t each other’s soulmates and they were okay with it since they both didn’t think finding “the one” was the sole purpose of life unlike most other people.   
  
She thought she had stability. If you didn’t suddenly start seeing colours while you’re with someone, they’re not your soulmate. But that also meant they’re not going to hurt you _too much_. She heard about people who were in relationships before they met their soulmate and they all talked about how they thought they knew love and hurt, but they didn’t because it’s a whole other dimension with that person. Emily never cared about whether the person she was with at the time was actually her soulmate or not when she had a good time and the other people never did either, so she never payed these people any attention.   
  
Now that she was experiencing it though, she _was_ seeing colour, she did start to fall for him – for Cal – it seemed different. He actually had the strength and the power to hurt her and have it last.

\--

Ever since that trip to Moldova, her infatuation with him hadn’t lessened – rather the opposite in fact. She caught herself staring at him more often, (though if that’s due to his hair and his cheeks gaining more and more saturation by the day or just his general being, she doesn’t know) and she felt like he’s noticed too, though he has yet to comment on it. Maybe he won’t. He’s a tease like that, holding back his comments on things he _knows_ she’s burning to hear his opinion on. Jackass. Sometimes she hated him a little bit for it.

  
(But she discovered that she loves him enough to make that small amount even smaller in relation to the love she’s come to feel for him.)

\--

They’re spending more time with each other ever since they came back from Moldova and by now, the days of her world being called in a soft grey were long over. She knew that the days were counted the first time that she discovered that mug that wasn’t quite like the others (a colour named blue, she learned) up until now where she rarely saw anything in the grey hues she was so used to. Anything but his eyes. They still remained grey to her and it’s given her more headaches and sleepless nights than she would like to admit. Is it some kind of metaphor? Unlock the heart, unlock the eyes? Does that mean he’s not loving her back? Does it even have a meaning at all or are his eyes just naturally grey? She heard of it, people with grey eyes by nature. Cal’s eyes however, were still a mystery for the time being, a secret being kept from her.

\--

He left the office hours ago, after getting all the paperwork done to an old case. It had been a frustrating one, horrible crime, horrible man, a nightmare to track down, but in the end, they got him.

Just as he thought to himself that he should probably use the rare opportunity and go to bed early, he had a knock on the door. It wasn’t a normal knock though, this one sounded rude _already_.

Sighing, he stood up and opened the door. Emily came walking in, a fury in her gaze that made his blood freeze.

“How dare you to do this to me?”, she asked.

“What?”

“How fucking dare you, to come into my life and mess everything up. I didn’t ask for this and I don’t think it’s fair, I was _fine_ without you.”

“So, this one is about me?”

“Of course, it’s about you.”

“Emily, tell me what the problem is. Is it something I can fix?”

She laughs.

“No, it’s not something you can _fix_.”, she spit out.

Emily walked towards him until they were standing eye to eye with barely any space between them.

“Why can’t I see your eyes? I see everything else but your eyes. Why is this? Another cruel joke from the universe?”

“I’m sorry, I’m not following. You can see my eyes.”

“No, I can’t. I can’t. I can see the blush flutter up in your cheeks, I can see the colour of your hair, of the shirts you choose to wear, but I can’t see your eye colour.”

  
Emily was standing so close to him, Cal could feel her breath on his face and her eyes staring him down.

He could let himself be backed into a corner or he could take the initiative.

“You know, I can’t see yours either.”, he smirks.

She stopped and looked at him, probably evaluating how serious he could be.

“Wanna find o-“

Emily rushed forward and kissed him. She interrupted him whilespeaking but somehow, Emily think he won’t mind being cut off like that.

She pushes him against the wall while he buried both of his hands in her hair.

She took a deep breath once they released each other and looked at him, and in that moment, she could see the warm brown iris in his eyes clearer than ever. The dimmed light from his desk lamp was just enough to cast a warm glow on his face.

He looked heavenly and she’d finally understood what all those people meant by it – he was beautiful in this light and she never wanted to miss it again. Emily doesn’t think she could live on without seeing these hazel eyes looking back at her every day.

  
They were both getting restless though, riled up with nervous energy as she pulled him into another kiss, and directed them both towards his bedroom.

Cal’s known colour for a few months now and he thinks that while it made his job significantly harder (he never realized how disgusting corpses and crime scenes were before), but also getting to see Emily everyday and not being able to stare at her like he wants to, like he longs to. She was ethereal and he’s so lucky.

So yeah, Cal Isaac has found the colour in his life and he’s never letting it go again.


End file.
